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Conflict Flavors Obama's Meeting With Chinese Leader

WASHINGTON — For the past two years, the critical question confronting the Obama administration about Xi Jinping, the Chinese president who defied American predictions by challenging the United States’ superpower status early and directly, has been how forcefully to respond.

When Mr. Xi, barely a year in office, declared an exclusive “air defense identification zone” over a vast stretch of territory, the Obama administration immediately sent B-52s right through the space, and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. spent seven hours with the new Chinese leader, telling him, as one participant in the discussion recalled, “You will be seeing a lot more of this.”

But on a range of issues since then, from how directly to challenge China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea to creating a cost for cyberespionage, the response has been less certain.